Changing the rules of the game

Tighter pogey rules may make it harder to keep experienced fishing crews

Seasonal workers and their employers spent Thursday afternoon trying to figure out what changes to the employment insurance program will mean for them.

What constitutes the “similar occupation” that seasonal workers will have to accept?

What jobs are available within an hour’s drive that could complement seasonal fishing and farming employment?

Will restricting access to employment insurance drive away the employees that seasonal business owners rely upon?

“Of course it will have negative effects,” said Virginia Boudreau.

“We are rural coastal communities and that’s where the resource is. We can’t conduct our industry anywhere else but beside where the fish are.”

The manager of the Guysborough County Inshore Fishermen’s Association represents 134 fishing boat owners and their crews in northeastern Nova Scotia. She warns that there aren’t many employment opportunities within an hour’s drive of Canso.

Meanwhile, she said, society still needs people providing it with food.

“Your pool of employees is drawn from your family units and your community because that’s where the culture and knowledge is,” said Boudreau.

“You can’t haul some unemployed boy from Halifax and put him on a fishing boat because Service Canada told him to go get a job. At the same time, you need to be able to offer the existing pool of available workers within these rural communities enough hours and access to EI so that they can live with some dignity.”

In announcing the tightening of restrictions on EI eligibility Thursday, Human Resources Minister Diane Finley said what constitutes a “similar occupation” will be clarified as the new rules come into effect.

Frequent users of EI — those who make at least three claims over a five-year period — will be required to immediately accept any job offering 80 per cent of their previous salary. After six weeks without work, they’ll be required to accept any job offer paying 70 per cent of their previous salary.

EI claimants will also have to provide more thorough proof that they are seeking work.

Three Nova Scotia fish processing company owners contacted declined to comment on whether the changes would affect their ability to attract and keep labour.

Fishermen’s EI benefits are calculated based upon a percentage of their best five weeks of earnings, meaning if prices and landings are good, they often receive top EI benefits.

According to Statistics Canada, 3,190 fishing enterprise owners collected EI in November 2011. No statistics were available for crew members.

North Grant fisherman Dan MacDougall said that while a large percentage of fishermen have either purchased additional commercial licences to expand their fishing seasons or added trades in recent decades, EI remains an important part of the industry.

“When you have a good deckhand, the last thing you say to him at the end of the fishing season is ‘I want you back next year,’” said MacDougall.

“A good deckhand makes a big difference and is a valuable asset. If these changes mean they’ll have to drive an hour to take a minimum-wage job in the fall, then it will be hard to keep them.”